Press Conference - The Clean Energy Tax Stimulus Act of 2008

Interview

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SEN. CANTWELL: Good afternoon. We're here today in a bipartisan fashion to talk about the introduction of the Clean Energy Tax Stimulus Act of 2008.

This subject matter, however, is not a new subject. We have been talking about how we can preserve over $20 billion in stimulus and 100,000 jobs in the U.S. economy this year by making sure that we give predictability in the tax credits for wind and solar, for biomass, for energy that we think can put new production into place this year.

That's why we are here together, and I want to thank my colleague Senator Ensign for his leadership role in this issue, and joining with me and the rest of our colleagues present today to support this legislation.

A lot can be accomplished if we work together. This is a broad agreement by both sides of the aisle to introduce legislation to help put more renewable energy into the marketplace.

We understand that we would like a bigger package, but what is most important is that we get these investment tax credits, production tax credits and efficiency tax credits into the hands of businesses this year, so that they can continue to make investments. When they make these investments, not only do we continue to stimulate our economy but we get green production going, and we also get production for the long term. We know that the underlying challenges of our economy today are high energy prices, and to continue to have investment in these renewable energies will help our economy just -- not just this year, in 2008, or in 2009, but long into the future as this production comes on line.

So I want to thank all of my colleagues for being here today: Senator Klobuchar, Senator Cornyn, Senator Sununu, Senator Craig. And obviously I want to thank again Senator Ensign for helping get this legislation crafted.

Senator Ensign.

SEN. ENSIGN: Thank you, Senator Cantwell. It's been a pleasure working with you over these last several weeks.

I think most senators want more renewable energy in the United States. The question was, how are we going to get there? There's been kind of a logjam. There's people for this and for that and against this and against that. And we wanted to come together on something -- we thought we could actually not only have a bipartisan group but actually get it done and get it signed into law this year. So we've worked with our -- the rest of our colleagues over the last several weeks to craft a bill that we thought we could get passed into law.

Now before, there were similar pieces of legislation but some of the pay-fors were objectionable to too many people.

So what we've done is we've put together these tax credits to stimulate not only the economy to protect those jobs, to produce more green power in the United States, but we've done it in a way that we think we can get passed through both the House and the Senate. And working with our colleagues, we're very excited about this because we now have 20 cosponsors, and that's just with very little effort we've gotten 20 cosponsors, bipartisan. Both Republicans and Democrats are sponsoring this bill. And over the next several days we hope to sign up the majority of our colleagues to join in this effort.

The bottom line is, do we want to be more and more dependent on foreign sources of energy? Do we want to have green and cleaner energies in the United States? And the answers, we feel, are in this legislation.

So, while we would have liked to have seen a larger package, this is something we think we can get done this year, still preserve the industries out there that are saying if we don't have this in the next few months, we can't plan for the future, we're going to have to start shutting down.

So this is very important legislation. We cannot afford to wait on this. And so it's critical that we get together, put all of our efforts in a bipartisan way, really in a nonpartisan way, to make sure that the energy future of the United States is cleaner, is less dependent on foreign sources, and helps our economy in the long run, as well.

SEN. CANTWELL: Next we're going to hear from Senator Klobuchar.

SEN. KLOBUCHAR: Well, thank you so much. Thank you, Senator Cantwell, Senator Ensign and everyone here for their leadership on this issue.

Every year I go around and visit the 87 counties in Minnesota, and I can tell you that energy comes up everywhere I go. Gasoline prices. They see this as a challenge, but more and more in our state, regular folks are seeing this as an opportunity. You talk to 10 employees at a solar panel factory in Starbuck, Minnesota, who actually left their jobs because they saw a future in renewable le energy. They did have me jump up and down on the solar panels to see if they would do hail damage. And I can tell you they don't. You see it in Pipestone, Minnesota, where they have so many wind turbines now that they opened up a bed and breakfast with a simple package deal that you go there, you stay overnight, and in the morning you wake up and look at a wind turbine.

You see it in a suburb in the Twin Cities called Maple Grove where, in a suburban shopping mall, they've actually put up a wind turbine for one of our energy companies.

And so people in our state are very excited about this. At the same time, they're very concerned about what's been going on with the Production Tax Credit, which has been really a game of green light-red light, over the years, with the investment lagging about eight months before every time that Production Tax Credit is going to go off.

And that's why I am so excited to be a part of this coalition, bipartisan coalition, here to say that we need to look to the future. We need to have long-term investment in energy so that these opportunities that people see really come true, and that we can really move to a clean energy future and invest in the farmers and the workers, of the Midwest and the South and the Southwest and all over this country, instead of the oil cartels of the Mideast.

Thank you very much.

(Cross talk.)

SEN. CANTWELL: Senator Sununu.

SEN. SUNUNU: Well, this to me is common sense, to extend and expand these renewable tax credits.

It's good policy, because these are technologies that exist, as Senator Klobuchar described. They're technologies that are clean. They're technologies that do reduce our reliance on foreign energy imports. We need to expand these tax credits, extend these tax credits so that we continue the process of innovation and investment.

Now, in New Hampshire, the sun doesn't shine as much as it does in the southern part of the country. We don't have the wind resources that the West or the Western Plains might have. But we do have a great history of sustainable forestry. And I want to thank Senator Cantwell and Senator Ensign for making sure that renewable credits for biomass and wood systems is part of the mix.

Renewables come in all shapes and forms. We want to make sure we extend the renewable tax credits to all forms of renewables. And making sure that our forestry industry is regarded in this legislation means that in New Hampshire, we'll continue to invest in a way that meets our renewable commitments and renewable goals. And we'll continue to have investment that continues to support job creation and economic opportunity in the forestry industry and those parts of our state that have a great tradition of investment in opportunity in forestry.

So I want to thank the sponsors. I'm a new member of the Finance Committee, but I know that John and Maria have worked very hard in putting this package together that absolutely can get passed, both chambers, can be signed into law this year.

SEN. CANTWELL: John?

SEN. CORNYN: Well, I'm proud to be a cosponsor of this clean energy bill and I congratulate Senator Cantwell and Senator Ensign for their strong leadership. And I think this demonstrates our shared commitment to energy diversity.

We need to -- when people ask me: What do we need more of? I say: We need all of the above, frankly, in order to reduce our dependence on imported energy from dangerous places in the world, some of whom are our declared enemies. While I don't believe we'll ever -- at least in the near term -- eliminate the need for more oil and gas, we know that both the environmental issues, the national security issues and the economic issues require that we find clean sources of renewable energy, and that's what this bill does.

And it creates a -- it allows companies to have a business model to actually make an investment, get the financing necessary in a reliable way that will assure that renewable energy remains an important part of our energy portfolio into the foreseeable future. So thanks for the great work that you all have done and I'm proud to be here with you.

SEN. CRAIG: This may not be the grand compromise, but it is a great compromise. And I thank both Maria and John for coming together and looking at the reality of the obvious, and that is that we have to sustain what we have underway. And we need to broaden it and grow it.

Idaho is a beneficiary of nearly every segment of this legislation. We have biomass. We are now seeing wind turbines crop up across our state. We have a new photovoltaic company that is located in Idaho. And we're proud of all of those.

But a month ago, I and Senator Domenici and Senator Bingaman and others sat down with probably the world's leading wind turbine companies. Now, they don't happen to be American. They don't happen to be U.S. But they are investing here and building here and we are now manufacturing here because of an element of this legislation, a sustained tax credit that is helping drive the wind industry in a way that we really did not expect it could happen.

We sat down with that group, we had invited them to our country from Spain and Europe, where this technology -- after we created it during the oil crisis of the '70s and then dropped it afterwards -- they picked it up and ran with it, matured it, and now we're bringing it back to our country.

Their first question was, are you going to sustain? We'll invest if you sustain. We'll build here if you sustain. And by that, I mean in providing the tax credits and the incentives that are driving this market right now.

Thanks, Maria. Thanks, John. Well done. This does exactly what we need to have happen to continue the broadening of our energy portfolio and the base that this bill reflects on.

Thank you.

SEN. CANTWELL: Thank you.

Pete?

SEN. DOMENICI: Thank you very much.

SEN. CANTWELL: Thank you.

SEN. DOMENICI: You did terrific.

SEN. CANTWELL: Right --

SEN. DOMENICI: Well, I didn't want to wait until the end because I'm less excited about this than others. I feel just as strongly about them -- about this as they do.

I've come to the conclusion that the United States is having economic problems that we don't quite understand. And I've tried to figure out whether somehow or another I could understand it, and I came to the conclusion that the American economy is having problems that we don't understand, that we can't cope with, because America cannot stand $100-a-barrel oil. It is just -- when you add it up, we're sending too many dollars, hard-earned dollars overseas, and it continues to go up and up solely and simply because $100-a-barrel oil is more than this great economy can afford.

And I've done as much as I can in my time here to move in other directions. Nuclear is on its way thanks to some things we did and to other people helping us. Wind is on its way, and it will be off its way if this legislation or something like it isn't passed, because the people who produce wind energy are relying upon -- and we don't know for how long -- but for now, they're relying upon the production tax credit in this bill. And if it isn't passed and doesn't become law, wind development will stop just as certain as it is now churning away with windmills across this land. It will start a slow stoppage, and then it will stop, and no new ones will come on board. That's bad news and the wrong thing.

The one-year extension of the production tax credit applies in a number of areas.

And I'll close by saying, when we started some 10 years ago with alternatives, we made a mistake. We thought solar energy was going to be -- was not going to be very useful. Not so. It turns out that breakthroughs have occurred in solar where it is higher on the list than ever before, and this still gives it a tax credit for even a longer period of time because it needs it. But the experts are telling us that many of the research things we did 15 years ago on solar and assumed were not any good are absolutely valid and that we're going to see more and more solar in the United States with every year if we do right like we're doing in this bill.

Thanks to everyone. The most important thing, and they know it because they've been -- they worked with us when we did the bill, is bipartisanship. You're not going to pass a bill, no matter how good it is, if one party goes down there and tries to take the lead, especially in something like this. So thank you for the bipartisan effort.

SEN. : Chuck?

SEN. SCHUMER: Well, I just want to thank all of my colleagues, and particularly Maria for her leadership here.

When the American people look at what's wrong with Washington, this is one of the things they point to. They understand our dependence on fossil fuels has to end. They understand we're sending a billion and a half dollars a day to people we don't like, and it messes up our foreign policy. They understand that -- (inaudible) -- they say Washington's not doing anything. They don't understand it, because there is such a consensus. And the great news here is that this bipartisan group can maybe break through the gridlock we've had on this issue and fulfill the wishes of the American people that we have a rational energy policy that gets us forward.

One of the great problems is, you know, people want things right away, let's get the cost of gasoline down a dollar. Well, now we've seen by not doing something serious and longer term, the price goes up. And even if it takes a couple of years for this to take effect and actually bring the price down, it's the best way we can do it.

So I want to thank Maria and I want to thank my colleagues.

SEN. CANTWELL: Thank you.

SEN. : Questions?

Q What about the PAYGO provisions? (Off mike) -- how are you going to get around the Finance Committee?

SEN. CANTWELL: Well, this is a bill introduction, and we're happy to have this bill take a lot of different courses. And we're happy that my colleagues Senator Baucus and Senator Grassley, I'm sure, are still discussing various ways to actually pay for this.

But if you look at the history of where we've been on this vote, we've had 59 votes to pay for these and we've had 59 votes not to pay for these and do it as stimulus.

So I'm looking for one more vote. And I think today we have found more than one more vote who are willing to do this as stimulative activity. So the majority of Democrats, in fact, I think, all the Democrats voted for this as part of the stimulus. And many Republicans did as well.

So we're saying that what's more important at this point in time is the $20 billion of investment and the 100 million jobs, and that it's not worth losing that investment in this cycle. So we'd like to see this bill done.

We're not foreclosing any other options or opportunities. But we think right now it's clear from who's here today that this has a very good chance of getting enough support to pass.

SEN. ENSIGN: You know, we argued this, you know, back and forth over the last several months. And Maria and I came to the conclusion that we can't afford to continue to just say, well, it's going to be worked out; well, we'll find some acceptable pay-fors.

So you know, we've introduced this bill today to create some momentum toward getting it passed. And that's why we're signing up as many of our colleagues on both sides of the aisle as we possibly can, because there's only going to be a few vehicles moved this year.

There may only be one or two more actual bills that are passed this year. And so we have to make sure that this bill is one of the bills that is passed this year. And by showing such a strong bipartisan group coming together, it gives it the best chance to pass.

Q (Off mike) -- about how quickly this can come to the floor for the Senate to move?

MS. : Well, I think if we do our work in the next couple of days and we get the majority of members signing up to this, I think they'll be thinking about how fast they can move it. We haven't got a commitment yet or a time frame.

But we've obviously kept people posted. We have been having this discussion. And what we've tried to emphasize which, I think, is critically important, in fact, this is about the investment cycle for this year.

At some point in time, you will miss the investment cycle for this year, because people will just start cancelling these projects. We are at the end of the first quarter. People have not had first quarter earnings reports, or I don't think very many people have. But they will start to do that in the next couple of weeks.

We always felt that we had to do this within, you know, 30-to-60 days of the closing of the first quarter. Otherwise companies would start to show their investors that these projects were going to come off their books. And we certainly didn't want that to happen.

SEN. SCHUMER: Just if I could add one thing as part of the Democratic leadership, I know, at our leadership meetings, we hope to do this in this eight-week work period, provided we can get the votes for it. It's a very high priority for our leadership to get this done.

SEN. ENSIGN: I brought this up in the Republican leadership on Tuesday and, or excuse me, on Monday. And there was broad support on the Republican leadership.

I've been talking to a lot of different -- the members. We've had communications with the White House. And, you know, so far really nothing but support. Some people, you know, haven't committed one way or the other, but there certainly hasn't been any strong opposition. And you know, it's because we've eliminated the controversial pay-fors that were in the original legislation.

Q Can I just follow up on this questions of pay-fors? Senator Cantwell, you mentioned that you believe you've found -- (off mike) -- it as a stimulative activity. Does that mean you believe that ultimately it will move without offsets?

SEN. CANTWELL: Well, I think the majority of my colleagues came to that conclusion in the stimulus package. I hope that they'll -- I mean, on the Democratic side -- I hope that they'll come to that conclusion again.

And I'm not -- you know, my personal opinion about this is I want a bigger energy package. I'd like to see something more robust than this. But I have learned a lot in working with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle about energy legislation, and the more you get done, the more you can follow that. This energy puzzle is not just one simple thing. And the more times that we have passed energy legislation, it lets us get to the next top issue.

And we know that right in front of us is an investment cycle that's about to implode if we don't give predictability. The last time we didn't give predictability, we saw a 77 percent decrease in investment in this area, and now is not a time for that. And so, let's get -- I believe we can get this done now, and we can get on to the rest of the elements of the energy package hopefully this year.

SEN. ENSIGN: One last comment on why this thing needs to be done and what can drive it. We have a lot of concerns with our environment right now. You hear that, you know, every time you turn around. We have a lot of concerns on national security, as well as the economy. All of those forces now need to come together to push this legislation.

This is not an end-all; this is just another good step forward toward making us less dependent on foreign oil and toward having a better environment and stimulating the economy in the United States all at the same time. That's why we think with all of those forces coming together we can pass this bill and get it signed into law this year.

Q (Off mike) -- an amendment to the housing bill?

SEN. ENSIGN: We're looking at all options right now.

STAFF: There's time for one more question.

Q This has been a -- some reports it's a 7 (billion dollar) to $8 billion bill. What are you guys looking for in terms of --

SEN. CANTWELL: Six, probably. Six.

Q Six?

SEN. CANTWELL: That's kind of the -- yeah.

SEN. ENSIGN: That's about the number that's been tossed around.

Q Have you talked to Madame Speaker about -- (off mike).

SEN. CANTWELL: I think we've let our House colleagues know that we're going to continue to look for avenues to get this done this year. I haven't -- we haven't briefed them on this specific bill.

Thank you.

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